


When Nella Wasn't There

by TheSkyLarkin



Series: SkyLarkin's Whumptober 2020 Fics [4]
Category: Ni no Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Background Character Death, Blood and Injury, Blood and Violence, Crossdressing, Darkest Timeline, Disguise, Dissociation, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Whump, Flashbacks, For Want of a Nail, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Hypothermia, Implied/Referenced Brainwashing, Mentioned Vermine (Ni No Kuni), Minor Character Death, Natural Disasters, Panic Attacks, Psychological Torture, Torture, Whump, Whumptober 2020
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-05
Updated: 2020-10-25
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:21:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26837380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSkyLarkin/pseuds/TheSkyLarkin
Summary: Currently on HaitusSomeone who isn’t Nella finds Evan and Roland during Mausinger’s coup, and the entire timeline is much worse off for it. A tale of the darkest timeline told in a series of interconnected vignettes, with one or two unique PoVs per chapter.Challenge: Whumptober 2020 (Chapters 1-5, 7)See the chapter summaries for the individual list of prompts filled per chapter.See the end notes for each chapter for comprehensive warnings/tags.
Relationships: Aranella & Evan Pettiwhisker Tildrum, Evan Pettiwhisker Tildrum & Ratja (Ni No Kuni), Leander Aristides/Queen Nerea, Ratja (Ni No Kuni) & Matthias | The Black Knight, Roland Crane & Evan Pettiwhisker Tildrum
Series: SkyLarkin's Whumptober 2020 Fics [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1946617
Comments: 18
Kudos: 16
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	1. The Right Mouse in the Wrong Place

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompts: No. 5 - “Where do you think you’re going?” “Rescue” “On the Run” “Failed Escape”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to MemoriesoftheAlhambra ([Tumblr](https://memoriesofthealhambra.tumblr.com/)/[Ao3](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MemoriesoftheAlhambra/pseuds/MemoriesoftheAlhambra)) for beta reading!

Ratja foolishly thought that the biggest hurdle that she had to face today in preparing for Master Evan’s coronation would be the uncooperative weather… then the coup began. One minute she was folding napkins, the next she was dodging a sword that instead found itself buried in a grimalkin guard’s neck.

She watches the utter confusion in Chester’s eyes turn to realization just before his assailant finishes the job and strikes the killing blow. She can’t help but scream as his lifeless body hits the floor, with empty eyes that continue to stare right at her. Oh Gods… and his wife just had kittens too…

“Sorry ‘bout that Ma’am.” The young mousefolk soldier’s tone is respectful of his elder (she babysat Martin and his siblings when they were still small), yet casual for one who had just struck down one of their fellow workers at the castle in cold blood. “But the liberation of our people is at hand! Mousekind will never have to suffer at the paws of the grimalkin in Ding Dong Dell ever again, not once King Mausinger takes the throne!”

He darts away, only to return just as quickly with an embarrassed expression. “Oh, er… me Mam told me to thank you for that tip about sheermint and scented sap. Now the rug in the entrance doesn’t smell like rotten cheese anymore! Gotta go!”

As he scurries away to join the uprising, Ratja briefly considers what Martin’s mother would have to say if she knew that her son had just murdered someone without batting an eye—the issue of their species aside—before getting back to the matter at hand. If Mausinger was currently leading an uprising against the grimalkin… then all those awful rumors about foul play having been involved in King Leonhard’s death, particularly Mausinger’s involvement, might have some merit to them. And if he were responsible, that meant that his closest associates Vermine and Matthias must be complicit as well...

‘ _Matthias… what in the world have you gotten yourself into this time?_ ’

That would explain why her fellow handmaiden Aranella was asking such odd questions over this past week leading up to the coronation, and also why she was so insistent about Ratja keeping it a secret from everyone else. At the time, Ratja had thought that she was worried that the kingdom was on the verge of war after she’d enquired about Matthias—Mausinger’s most loyal soldier, something that Ratja would never have expected out of such a fiercely independent mouse like him before he started working as a knight in the castle—and mentioned a lot of grimalkin soldiers being sent far away from the castle. The suspicious individuals she brought up during their conversations had all been mousefolk...

Wait, did the other handmaiden suspect Ratja of being in on the conspiracy because she is mousefolk as well? Ratja tries not to take the thought to heart, Aranella would merely be doing her duty if this were the case. Nella is Master Evan’s bodyguard after all: she received special combat and magical training (that the other handmaidens were forbidden from learning) when King Leonhard chose her for that role. If she suspected a plot against the Prince’s life, that could explain why Vermine has kept sending her on such long errands to the far ends of the kingdom.

If only Aranella was here now. Ratja hasn’t seen a sign of her over the few days since they last spoke. There is still one last obstacle between Mausinger and seizing the throne: Master Evan. Of course a plot to kill him and seize power would account for getting rid of his most loyal protector, thus leaving him defenseless during the chaos of a coup.

But what could a mere handmaid like herself do against armed soldiers? She doesn’t know the first thing about fighting…

‘ _...but King Leonhard himself chose you to work here because he admired your quick-thinking and loyalty,_ ’ she reminds herself. ‘ _And if you don’t help young Master Evan, who else will? Enough with the rhetorical, there’s work to be done._ ’ Abandoning the napkins, Ratja snatches the sharpest-looking piece of silverware in her reach (a fish-knife) off the table before hiking up her skirts and making a mad dash towards the other end of the castle where Master Evan should be preparing for the coronation. There’s nothing else for it; she’ll just have to make do as she goes along.

* * *

Ratja doesn’t get very far before the sounds of gunshots and swords clashing reach her ears. She sprints towards the noise only to find Master Evan and a human (who looked as if he’d taken quite a few hits) in strange clothes she’s never seen before, completely surrounded by soldiers and skeleplasms. One of the youngest of the castle sorceresses is in the middle of casting a spell at them, and Ratja might not know all that much about magic but she can tell it isn’t a friendly spell—there’s far too much fire—

“Cornflower, wait!” Ratja screams at the top of her lungs as she rushes into the room. All eyes swivel towards her in confusion. Master Evan visibly perks up at her arrival, but she tries not to look directly at him. The sorceress looks very put out that a mere handmaid has just interrupted her big moment (Ratja knew her family as well; Cornflower has always been a haunty young thing, even as a child), and glares impatiently as she waits for an explanation that Ratja doesn’t have just yet. Ratja’s eyes fall upon the stranger in his foreign garb. She’s never been outside of Ding Dong Dell before, but she’s seen pictures of what members of other species from other kingdoms wear once before…

“There’s a whole bunch of humans like him from er, Broadleaf attacking the armory and main hall right now!” Judging by the stranger’s split-second reaction as Ratja points to him, he is not in fact from Broadleaf. But the utter confusion quickly leaves his face before anyone else can notice. (Whoever he is, he must be a skilled liar. If the circumstances were different, Ratja wouldn’t trust him.) “They’ve already broken through the outer defenses! Captain Buck sent me to find reinforcements, you have to come and help! Quickly!”

The soldiers mutter uneasily and turn towards the doors. Ratja has always tried not to take advantage of her seniority in the castle, especially regarding the other mousefolk, but it seems to be coming in handy here. She just might be able to pull this off…

“And what of these two?” asks Cornflower impatiently, indicating to Master Evan and the peculiar human. The prince looks at the intruder in confusion, but he doesn’t say a word. The dark-haired human watches Ratja intently as she scoffs that surely it won’t take _all_ of these soldiers to keep an eye on _two_ people when there’s a much larger invasion force threatening the castle right this moment, Cornflower? _Especially_ once they’re disarmed?

Ratja punctuates this with a pointed look aimed at two of the closest soldiers, who are suddenly struck with the brilliant idea to wrench the gun and dagger away from their captives, as well as kicking the sword on the ground away. Ratja can’t recall their names at the moment, but she does remember also watching over them when they were much younger. They were never the sharpest tools in the shed, perhaps she can use that somehow...

“‘Keep an eye on them?’ Why not just kill them now and be done with them?” Cornflower asks doubtfully. Master Evan’s eyes fill with panic. The stranger keeps his face expressionless but moves to nudge the prince behind him protectively, as if expecting another fight.

Ratja takes a deep breath. This will either make or break her deception...

“And deprive King Mausinger of the pleasure of killing off the wretched brat himself?” Ratja asks her with a sneer, putting as much vitriol as she could fake into those last three words. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Master Evan’s ears stiffen in shock and the stranger’s eyes narrow.

“Be reasonable now, Cornflower. Why throw away the gratitude you could receive from the new King himself once you bring him his most wanted enemy away just because it’s more convenient to you now? Let me just take him off your hands until the situation is dealt with, then you can present him to Mausinger yourself. That way you’ll have captured the enemy and had a hand in stopping a foreign invasion!”

“And why should I believe you?” asks Cornflower suspiciously. The young sorceress has always been a tad impertinent ever since being hired at the castle, but uncertainty is creeping into her voice as she tries to remain confident in her skepticism of Ratja’s intentions. “How do I know that you won’t just bring them to King Mausinger yourself and take all the credit?”

Ratja points to the two guards holding the stolen weapons and commands them to help her take the two prisoners to the former Prince’s bedroom until the invading force has been driven back. They’ll vouch for her that Cornflower was the one who captured soon-to-be-former Prince Evan and his attempted rescuer, right? With the guards' affirmations, Cornflower still briefly hesitates before unsummoning the skeleplasms and rallying the guards to head towards the supposed attack.

Alright, six down and two to go. Ratja pointedly ignores the shock and betrayal on Master Evan’s face as she picks up the discarded sword on the ground before ordering the guards to frog-march their prisoners back to the prince’s bedroom. The blade feels awkward in her grip, but she keeps it pointed threateningly at the human stranger for the whole walk. Halfway there, Master Evan turns around and tries to ask her why she’s doing this, but Ratja snarls at him to shut up before his pleas can affect her enough to break her cover. Her resolve nearly breaks as his ears droop and he turns away with a sniff. The guards find this hysterical for some reason, and their laughter carries them all the way to their final destination.

As the captives are all but thrown into the ornate bedroom, Ratja stops the guards at the door when they attempt to follow. “Give me their weapons so I can guard the door from the inside,” she commands them. “You stay here and guard the door from _this_ side.”

“Uh… will you be okay all by yourself, Ma’am?” One of the guards asks skeptically, looking at the two captives then back at the one handmaid.

Ratja motions for him and his compatriot to come closer. “Now you listen to me, young one. I’ve been working in this wretched castle for decades, _slaving away_ for these pampered grimalkin since before that little whelp was a kitten,” she explains to them in a loud whisper. It's not a complete lie, but more of an exaggeration. There were times in the past when she would be assigned twice as much work as some of the other handmaidens... “Now, I promised Cornflower that she’d get credit for bringing them in alive, but they only have to be _alive_ when we bring them in… Just like you and your families, I’ve lost so much to the cruelty of the grimalkin. Let’s just say I’ve got a score to settle, do you know what I mean?”

It takes them a moment, but they finally pick up on what she’s putting down and hand her the weapons with expressions of sick glee, which makes something in her stomach twist. Master Evan dejectedly tries not to meet her gaze but the stranger regards her warily as she closes the door on the two soldiers. His expression of distrust doesn’t shift as she then grabs one of the chairs to block the door behind her, but he does raise an eyebrow in surprise as she then hands him both the sword and the gun back before approaching Evan.

The soon-to-be-deposed Prince flinches away from her at first before confusion spreads across his face once Ratja hands him back the dagger. “I’m so sorry for tricking you, Master Evan, but I had to make this look convincing,” she whispers to him. “I know this room has secret passages that connect elsewhere in the castle, so I had to get you back here in order to escape without anyone following us. You’ve still got the Mark of Kings, right?”

Evan—just Evan, now that Mausinger has taken control of the castle, Ratja supposes—nods silently, a slight twinge of hope spreading across his face. He creeps over towards one of the statues in the corner of the room, and both Ratja and the stranger can’t help but wince as _the entire room_ shakes with the force it takes for the entire four-poster bed to loudly slide to the side and reveal the entrance to a hidden room below.

“What was that noise!?” One of the guards demands as the doors stain against the flimsy chair barricade. By the time they’ve successfully broken into the room, the secret passage has been sealed shut behind Ratja, Evan, and his new friend Roland.

* * *

The rain is still pouring down as the three fugitives make their way out of Ding Dong Dell Castle through the secret passages opened up by the Mark of Kings. The network of cramped and twisting passageways that ran through the castle walls was musty and filled with cobwebs, so the downpour is actually a pleasant change once Ratja, Evan, and Roland squeeze themselves out of a tiny hidden door at the base of a tower just outside the main castle’s entrance. It’s nice to breathe again, if only for a brief second.

The heavy floor-length hooded cloaks that Ratja managed to snag for each of them (she was fortunate that there happened to be one in Evan’s size) are keeping them dry for the moment. Still, Ratja feels particularly vulnerable with just the clothes on their backs, the arms band and wand that had been in the chest holding the Mark of Kings for Evan, another arms band that someone had accidentally left in the laundry room among the cloaks for Roland, a small metal helm that would afford Evan some protection (and also hide his grimalkin ears) also pinched from the same room, and her own stolen fish-knife as their sole possessions as they make their desperate escape. She would have liked to gather some more supplies and provisions for their journey, but the passageways didn’t link up to the maid’s quarters and Roland deemed it too risky to move about in the open while the castle was on high alert for a group of “foreign invaders”.

This was an issue because Ratja would really have liked to get him some soreaway; it would be advantageous to have their best fighter in perfect health (as Evan had only really fought in theory, and Ratja had never been in any sort of combat situation at all) as they leave the kingdom and head out into the wilderness beyond, where monsters roamed the lands freely. Roland insisted that he’d be just fine—that his only injuries were only arbitrary scrapes and bruises anyway—but she did hesitate as they passed by the door to the castle infirmary and peered out of the secret passage. Unfortunately, she spotted Matthias’s distinctive shadow coming around the corner and quickly scurried back into the passageway before he could notice her.

“Who is that, Ratja?” Evan asked in a whisper as the armored knight clanged right past the hidden door, oblivious to their presence.

“That’s Matthias, or the Black Knight—as he’s taken to calling himself nowadays,” Ratja explained sadly. “We used to be good friends when we were younger… but he’s been so distant from me and everyone else since he began working for Mausinger. It’s like something has changed him, and not for the better. Rumor has it that he’s been messing around with forbidden, dark magics. I don’t think even Nella would stand a chance against him now.”

It’s only now that Ratja realizes that she’s never going to get to talk to Matthias, Martin, or anyone else at the castle—or even the whole kingdom—ever again. With Mausinger in charge, she’s now a traitor to Ding Dong Dell for helping Evan. She tries to push these thoughts aside for now as Roland reminds her and Evan that they need to keep going; Mausinger’s soldiers are no doubt still searching for them.

A small crowd of citizens (a mixture of humans and grimalkin) are clustered outside the entrance to the castle, watching the smoke still rising up from the castle and speculating amongst themselves as the former prince and his two collaborators sneak past unnoticed. As the onlookers watch, the flag at the top of the castle bearing the Tildrum insignia is removed, only for a banner with the Mausinger emblem to rise and replace it shortly, prompting gasps of shock and concern.

Evan spares the innocent citizens of the kingdom he’s leaving behind one last mournful glance before leading Ratja and Roland down the passage that hides the entrance to the Kingsway. (Luckily Nella had taken him here once before, or they would have had to try and sneak out of the kingdom through the heavily fortified and guarded main gate.)

Even with all this rain, the walkway that runs adjacent to the storm drain hasn’t been flooded yet, so everyone makes it into the secret passage that will take them out of the kingdom with dry shoes. Just as well, as the fields outside the kingdom are probably full of muddy puddles by now. Again, Ratja wishes that she could have made one quick stop by her room; she doesn’t know how much ground she’ll be able to cover in these flats versus a sturdy pair of boots…

…but looking over at young Evan’s dejected expression reminds her that those are just petty complaints in comparison to what he’s dealing with. Back at the castle, Evan quietly asked her if Mausinger had started a rebellion because he was to be crowned king. Both Ratja and Roland were quick to assure him that this wasn’t the case, and Roland correctly guessed that it instead had to do with the species divide within the kingdom.

“Grimalkin and Mousefolk have been fighting for control over Ding Dong Dell for generations, sometimes openly and sometimes not,” she explained to the newcomer from far away. (It was a bit strange to Ratja that Roland refused to clarify where exactly he was from, only that it was “further away than Broadleaf”—although he didn’t seem to know where Broadleaf was.) “The grimalkin have held the throne ever since one of Evan’s ancestors formed the first Kingsbond with Oakenheart—” There was a five-second look of pure bafflement from Roland yet again. “—and… let’s just say that life under the reign of most of the grimalkin kings had never been kind to the mousefolk.”

“But King Leonhard, Evan’s father, was different: he spoke of creating peace and equality between the grimalkin and the mice, and then actually followed up on his promises. In fact, I would have never had my position at the castle if Leonhard hadn’t committed to opening up more job opportunities for mousefolk. Mausinger himself was made Chancellor largely in part because Leonhard wanted a mouse who was already an activist for species equality to help him achieve their shared goal. For a time, it seemed like Ding Dong Dell was on the way to real, lasting peace…”

She trailed off as her gaze fell to Evan. Should she tell him her suspicions? Or was it actually far crueler to tell him? Taking a deep breath, Ratja looked the young man right in the eyes as she told him of the terrible rumors that King Leonhard had died of poisoning and it had all been orchestrated by Mausinger.

At first Evan responded with denial, still insisting that his father had died of a rare untreatable illness, but his face fell as Roland pointed out how suspicious the timing was—Mausinger just so happened to be prepared with a perfectly orchestrated coup, as if he knew exactly when Leonhard was due to die. Ratja agreed, pointing out how Leonhard had been the picture of perfect health up until a year ago, when the poisoning was said to have begun. Evan was very quiet from that point onwards.

“Ratja?” Roland’s quiet voice jolts her out of her recollections. “Are you going to be okay with being branded a traitor to your own people if you come with us?” Evan looks up at her, as if now just considering this as well. “We could always come up with some excuse—”

“Oh no, don’t you worry about me,” Ratja assures them both with as much of a grin as she can muster. “I may not be as strong as Aranella, but I’ve been able to hold my own all these years with just my wits.”

To just Evan, she adds, “Besides, if anyone is a traitor to Ding Dong Dell, it’s Mausinger for destroying the fragile peace that your father worked so hard to create.”

They’re nearing the end of the Kingsway; Ratja can see the door at the end surrounded by a halo of green magical energy. She turns to address Evan specifically again. “I made a promise to your father to help you in any way I could, Evan, and I intend to keep it. We’re going to get you out of her and find someplace safe, don’t you worry. And one day, you’ll return to Ding Dong Dell to reclaim the throne that’s rightfully yours!”

Evan nods, somewhat reluctantly, as he holds up the Mark of Kings. Reacting to the ancient magics placed upon the royal pendant, the Kingsway door slides open to reveal the vast fields beyond. Ratja always wanted to see the lands beyond Ding Dong Dell someday…but not like this. Quickly and quietly, the fugitives step through the threshold and into the wilds past the kingdom’s walls.

* * *

The storm refuses to let up, even after Evan, Roland, and Ratja have been walking for what feels like a few long, miserable hours. Water has begun to seep through the heavy cloaks and everyone’s shoes are caked in mud. Not even the monsters seem to want to be out in this weather, as their path has been clear for most of the journey. Nevertheless, the three of them are on high alert, jumping a little with every stray footfall or snapping twig. They stay silent, partly to conceal their nerves and partly to conserve energy for the long trek still to come.

At long last, they make it to the largest of the stone bridges that stretches across the mighty Resonant River at the bottom of the gorge miles below, connecting the lands of Ding Dong Dell to the wild and mostly uninhabited Rolling Hills. Ratja opens her mouth to explain that they should be much safer once they’ve gotten past the bridge until she spots a large figure at the other end of the bridge walking towards them.

The menacing sight of the Black Knight, having somehow beaten them here and advancing upon them like a wall covered in spikes, gets them to turn around and attempt to flee back the way they came. However, a considerable number of Ding Dong Dellian soldiers have appeared out of nowhere and are now blocking their path backward. With their enemies at both ends of the bridge, there is nowhere for Evan, Ratja, and Roland to run.

“And just where do you think you’re going?” Mausinger asks with a wide sneer as he steps out of the swarm of soldiers with Vermine to leer menacingly at them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Constructive criticism is appreciated!
> 
> Triggers/Warnings: Minor character death, Deception


	2. Love is a Ghost That The Others Can't See

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompts: No. 6 - “Please…” “No More” “Stop, Please”  
> No. 9 - “For the Greater Good” “Take Me Instead”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to MemoriesoftheAlhambra ([Tumblr](https://memoriesofthealhambra.tumblr.com/)/[Ao3](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MemoriesoftheAlhambra/pseuds/MemoriesoftheAlhambra)) for beta reading!
> 
> The title is taken from [Familiar by Agnes Obel](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvMBE0XuWKg)

There is a voice in his head, and it doesn’t belong to him.

Lord Mausinger’s orders were simple: Locate Evan Pettiwhisker Tildrum and dispose of him, as well as anyone who stands in the way of doing so, by any means necessary. And so the Black Knight finds himself on a slippery bridge in the middle of a storm, blocking his target from escaping the lands of Ding Dong Dell and Mausinger’s intended fate for him. With the other end of the bridge blocked by a platoon of soldiers, the only other means of escape would be leaping over the side of the bridge into the turbulent waters of the Resonant River below—a suicidal and foolish move indeed.

“There you are, _Your Majesty_ ,” Lord Mausinger calls out to the soon-to-be deceased prince as he steps forward confidently—with Vermine just a step and a half behind him the entire time—even as the Black Knight’s target and his companions have drawn their weapons. The Black Knight can see the glint of arrows as they are notched into bows behind Mausinger in response. “Much as it pains me, I’m afraid I must ask you and your… associate to relinquish your lives.”

The Black Knight couldn’t care less if either the grimalkin child or the Broadleaf spy surrenders or attempts to put up a fight, as his orders are to cut them down without mercy all the same. But Matthias? Matthias cries out in alarm as the handmaiden leaps in front of the boy, table knife in her shaking paws, placing herself between him and both Mausinger and the Black Knight. Despite her palpable fear, she stares them both down defiantly.

‘ _Ratja, cease this foolishness at once!_ ’ Matthias commands her, to no avail. (He’d never listened to her, and she’d never listened to him. This much has not changed.) The Black Knight says nothing.

Mausinger meets her gaze, though not without some level of discomfort. “It is terribly unfortunate, I—”

“Mausinger!” The dethroned child interrupts, attempting to step forward and stand by Ratja until he is held back by the foreign human. “Tell me the truth: did you have my father poisoned!?” His voice shakes with emotion, but he holds his ground and waits for an answer.

“Yes. Yes, I killed Leonhard!” Mausinger finally admits out loud, without an ounce of shame in his voice. The boy and the handmaiden seem shocked by the sheer brazenness of the confession. “It had to be done. And I would do it again in a heartbeat!”

Behind him, Vermine attempts to catch the Black Knight’s eye, a particularly self-satisfied grin plastered upon his face. In the back of his head, Matthias quietly mutters something about the needs of the many, and how only violent revolution will bring about real change to Ding Dong Dell. The Black Knight does not react.

Drawing his sword, Mausinger points it at Evan as he roars, “For far too long, our kind has suffered at the hands of you grimalkin!” The spy pulls the boy behind him protectively against the stone railing of the bridge, and looks back and forth at both ends as if attempting to discern if either could be a viable escape option. Neither of them would be, the Black Knight would certainly make sure of it.

“So that’s your plan then? To make the grimalkin suffer as the mice have?” Ratja asks, dismayed. “All of your talk of peace and equality over the years, and this was your true goal all along? To dethrone the tyrant, only to immediately take his place?”

‘ _Ratja, you don’t understand!_ ’ Matthias retorts, in equal parts frustration and desperation. ‘ _Why must you side with our oppressors!? Stop, please! Before…_ ’ The Black Knight does not reply.

Mausinger doesn’t seem to have an answer for her, but Vermine is more than happy to step in. “Ignore this hysterical handmaiden, my Lord,” he snidely advises Mausinger. “She’s been brainwashed by years of servitude to the grimalkin. I hardly think—”

“Hysterical?” Ratja repeats incredulously. “I’ve worked at the castle just as long as “Lord” Mausinger has and can speak for myself, you… you slimeball sycophant!” (Vermine bristles at the harsh rebuke.) Turning back to Mausinger, she asks, “What has happened to you? You always said that violence would beget more violence, that only voluntary cooperation between the mice and the grimalkin would lead to a peaceful future for Ding Dong Dell! But now you do not fight for peace and equality for mousekind—only power for yourself! How can you not see this? When did you become so… twisted?”

The Black Knight has heard enough and moves to strike down this most bothersome impediment to his Master’s plans. But Matthias, with a feral scream, stops him from raising his sword. ‘ _No, no you can’t! A-anyone but her! Ratja is still my friend, even if—_ ’

‘ _She is a traitor to the kingdom, and for that her punishment is clear,_ ’ the Black Knight answers as he attempts to regain control of this body. ‘ _All who disobey Lord Mausinger are traitors to mousekind. And all traitors must die, for the sake of Ding Dong Dell._ ’

‘ _No! We can make an exception!_ ’ Matthias begs him. ‘ _You heard Ratja; she’s been friends with Lord Mausinger for all this time… We can change her mind about the boy, and he’ll make an exception for her, just this once! Please… just… I can’t… I can’t lose her too!_ ’

The Black Knight feels nothing, not even the sorrow in the tears running down his cheeks under the heavy helmet that conceals his face. ‘ _Let go,_ ’ he commands Matthias. ‘ _You are weak. This is the sole reason for my existence: I am here because you were too weak to do what your Master asked of you, too soft to do what must be done for the sake of your species. You were all too eager to surrender your life to me for power, too willing to give up your free will and fade into nothingness if it meant your Master’s will was carried out and you did not have to feel guilt for your actions._ ’

‘ _No! No more!_ ’ His paws were trembling with Matthias’s effort, the sword slowly slipping out of his grip. ‘ _As long as there is a scrap of me left in this body, you shall not harm a hair on Ratja’s head!_ ’

‘ _Cease your futile resistance. **You will feel nothing.**_ ’

The Black Knight manages to wrest control back and looks up to see the handmaiden place a paw on the boy’s shoulder. “Go,” she begs him, with a voice full of resignation to what must be done. “You are the kingdom’s last hope, Evan! You cannot die here!” Over his stuttered protests, she locks eyes with the spy and they exchange grim expressions and nods of understanding. As the foreigner suddenly grabs the grimalkin child and vaults over the side of the bridge in one fluid motion, the handmaiden turns with her face set in a determined scowl, teeth grit. She charges at Mausinger with a feral scream, knife gripped with both paws.

“RATJAAAAAAAA!” screams the boy as he goes over; so too does the voice in his head as his once dear friend makes a foolish attempt at his Lord’s life.

Arrows clatter uselessly against the stone as the spy and the boy are long gone, consumed by the river beneath. More soldiers charge towards the handmaiden, but the Black Knight gets there first. Over the desperate screaming in his head, he raises his sword and strikes downwards. The blade tears through flesh effortlessly, and the handmaiden hits the ground with her throat sliced clean open, blood staining the stones bright crimson. As the last gargle escapes Ratja's throat, the voice in his head finally falls silent forever too.

The Black Knight, alone in his head at last, glances up to see Mausinger staring at him in shock and revulsion. Even Vermine seems horrified at the brutality before him, despite having gleefully watched the senseless slaughter of many grimalkin soldiers mere hours earlier. “All who disobey Lord Mausinger are traitors to mousekind,” the Black Knight repeats monotonously, “and all traitors must die, for the sake of Ding Dong Dell.”

_**You will feel nothing.**_

* * *

“You.”

Martin instinctively clasps a paw over his mouth as Lord Mausinger walks towards him. Had he seen him crying over the traitor? What will he say? “Y-yes, my Lord?” he squeaks, trying (and failing) to keep his voice even.

Without looking back, Lord Mausinger motions to the body lying on the bridge behind them. The Black Knight and most of the other soldiers have long departed to look for the remains of the deposed prince downstream, and Vermine followed the remaining guards back to the castle. “Take a shovel, come back after sunset, and bury her,” he orders Martin, in a low voice. “Tell no one.”

“Bury her? Uh… where, my Lord?”

“In the ground, you simpleton! Where else!?”

Lord Mausinger stalks off, cursing under his breath, as Martin stands there in bewilderment. Why is he so insistent on Auntie Ratja— er, the traitor receiving a proper burial? After what she almost did? And why is he being so secretive about it? Lord Mausinger is about to become king, after all; who could he possibly be afraid of?

Tears build up in his eyes again as he thinks about this grim mission that has been given to him. What is he supposed to tell people if they ask where he's going so late at night when the celebration for Lord Mausinger's coronation is sure to be in full swing? What is he going to say to the other handmaidens of the castle if they ask him where Ratja has gone?

… oh Gods, how is he supposed to explain all of this to his mother!?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Constructive criticism is appreciated!
> 
> Triggers/Warnings: Implied Brainwashing, Implied Dissociation, Split Personality, Graphic Violence, Major Character Death, Somehow a Worse Case of Fridging that the Actual Game (and That was Already Some Bullshit, Let Me Tell You…), Blood


	3. Roland Crane's Short Riverside Stroll

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompts: No. 7 - “I’ve Got You” “Carrying”  
> No. 30 - “Wound Reveal” “Ignoring an Injury”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to MemoriesoftheAlhambra ([Tumblr](https://memoriesofthealhambra.tumblr.com/)/[Ao3](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MemoriesoftheAlhambra/pseuds/MemoriesoftheAlhambra)) for beta reading!

Roland Crane’s first coherent thought upon waking up face down and half-drowned is that perhaps leaping off a high bridge into the unfamiliar waters below was perhaps not the wisest move.

It’s still raining cats and dogs as he returns to consciousness on the rocky shores of the embankment, soaked to the bone and shivering. At the very least, he’s still alive. After surviving an explosion that leveled a city and a castle full of angry micemen, drowning or being crushed to death on sharp rocks by the river’s current would be both terrible and ironic ways to go. Even so, he should have at least asked Evan if he knew how to swim first before—

Wait a moment, where is Evan?

The young man—Cat-man? Grimalkin-man? He should have asked earlier—is nowhere in sight. At least not within Roland’s current limited range of vision that mostly consists of river rocks and dirt, with a touch of green at the peripherals. Roland tries to sit up, and immediately encounters a snag in his plan as the world tilts violently when he tries to leave the ground. Once the rocks below him have stopped oscillating, Roland has to reckon with the fact that he hasn’t gotten out of the trip downstream as unscathed as he initially thought.

The first major injury he’s aware of is the throbbing, open gash that slices clean through the middle of his right palm. Roland hopes that this world of swords and sorcery has some “magical” equivalent of antibacterial gel because the area around the wound is definitely inflamed. Hopefully he won’t have to do any more fighting for a while, since that _is_ his dominant hand…

The arms band snuggly clamped onto his upper right arm under his suit survived the long journey down the river, but the heavy cloak Ratja also found for him has not. It wouldn’t have provided much more warmth—since it would have gotten just as drenched and sliced up as the rest of his clothing—but Roland still might have been able to cut it up to use for bandages. With no chain pharmacies or first aid stations anywhere in sight, Roland is forced to sacrifice his tie to stem the bleeding for the moment. He can only hope that the other various aches and pains underneath his suit are just bruises as he finally rallies the strength to stand.

Now vertical, Roland has a much better view of the untamed wilderness around him. This land of sloping plains dotted with patches of forest appears completely uninhabited at first, and Roland has to assume that whatever wildlife lives around here has been driven to seek shelter from the pouring rain. A stolen sword and his gun tucked away in his arms band ensure that he isn’t totally defenseless, but combat in his current injured state doesn’t sound like an appealing concept at the moment. With the stormy weather, it’s hard to tell what time of day it is, but the sky above appears to be getting darker. If Evan is still alive, Roland definitely needs to find him before night falls.

Attempting to retrace his path by following the river, Roland can’t see the castle or the high bridge in the rolling slopes upstream; the strong current must have carried him quite the distance. That wouldn’t have been a particularly difficult feat considering all this rain must be filling up what seems like an already large river.

This means two things for him. First of all, Mausinger’s soldiers—if he had sent anyone at all after them, assuming that they had drowned in the storm-bloated river wouldn’t have been an unreasonable conjecture—might not search this far from the castle, especially in a storm like this after their big victory. Secondly, the much lighter Evan had probably washed up further downstream.

Roland needs to find the boy before a soldier or (much more likely) a wild animal does, his own current state be damned. Taking a deep breath to let the feeling of having been stuffed in a washing machine with sharp rocks for several consecutive cycles pass over him, Roland starts to follow the river downstream.

As he trudges along the riverbank, scanning the shores for the missing prince, Roland notices a few twinges in his left leg and can only hope that it’s nothing but muscle stiffness. There’s a sharp, stabbing pain in his right side that gets worse as he keeps trodding along, which he also tries his best to ignore. There’s no time to waste, Evan could be in serious danger right now. The icy winds coming down from upriver send shivers up his spine, but all he can do is cross his arms to keep what little body heat he has from escaping.

Aside from the constantly falling rain and the roar of the rushing river beside him, Roland is completely alone with his thoughts for the first time since the castle. This entire situation has been absolutely insane: the missile strike, being spirited away to a medieval fantasy world full of cat and mouse people at war, knights in armor and magic spells, a surprise coup, and this kid who reminds him so much of his own son…

This has to be a dream, there’s no other rational explanation for all of this. Roland must have been killed in the explosion—or maybe he’s comatose in a hospital somewhere, dying from the effects of extreme radiation poisoning due to his close proximity to ground zero of the explosion—and this was all a manifestation of his guilty subconscious in the last few minutes of his life. (He’d seen more than enough movies with that last-second twist ending.) God knows he’d racked up a laundry list of regrets over his past term…

Perhaps Mausinger’s coup was an allegory for the international tensions that lead to a missile fired at a city with one of the highest population densities in his country: he’d failed to predict the scenario and deal with it as the leader of his nation, but due to his country’s position on the world stage and their history of foreign hostility, maybe this was an inevitable outcome in some form or another. And Aranella, Evan’s governess whom he’d mentioned earlier, represented the false hope that someone or something would come along and miraculously fix an unsolvable problem. As for Evan himself—

“Evan!” Roland shouts—or at least tries to, but it comes out as a rasp more than a yell—as he spots a familiar silhouette lying on the shore just ahead. A jolt of pain races up his leg and through his right side as he hurries over to the unresponsive boy, but he pushes those concerns to the back of his mind, fingers trembling as he checks Evan for a pulse. The deposed prince is clearly breathing, but unconscious. Even the old “slapping-someone-in-the-face-with-their-own-hand” trick fails to wake him up. To Roland’s admittedly untrained eye, Evan doesn’t appear to have any head injuries that may be causing this. The helmet that Ratja found might be gone, but it could very well have protected him through the rougher stretches of the river.

The sky above continues to darken; the night is drawing closer, and Roland does not want to try and test his luck out here in the open with Evan unconscious and vulnerable. There are a lot more suspicious noises coming from the patches of forest surrounding the riverbanks now. Evan clearly needs medical attention—and to be perfectly honest, so does he. With no other options, Roland leans down to pick up Evan… and nearly drops him at first, as every muscle in his body screams in protest at the extra weight. Yeah, he is _definitely_ going to need medical attention from whatever qualifies as such in this world…

…once he can find his way to the nearest village or town, wherever that may be. Roland recalls passing by a stone bridge that ran across the river at its narrowest point when he’d followed the river downstream. Hopefully, there would be some fresh footprints in the mud at the end of that bridge that hadn’t yet been washed away by the rain that could point the way towards something approximating civilization… he just has to make it back there with Evan first.

Roland unlatches Evan’s cloak before taking a deep breath and attempting to lift him up once again. Losing the drenched cloth had shed a few pounds, and it wasn’t as if it had been keeping him warm in this waterlogged state anyway. Roland would have thrown away the Mark of Kings as well if it had been heavier, and if the bauble hadn’t had the ability to open hidden doors as he’d seen during their escape from the castle.

“I’ve got you, kid,” he mutters through gritted teeth as he tries to figure out how to carry Evan while causing himself the least amount of pain. At least this arrangement will help both of them conserve more body heat somewhat—it’s steadily getting colder as the night draws closer...

As Roland rearranges Evan on his back, he thanks whichever benevolent force in this universe decided to turn back the clock on him by twenty or so years, because this would have been all but impossible had he still been forty-eight. Not that carrying Evan while favoring one leg isn’t going to be a struggle at this age as well. Even so, he presses onwards—what other option does he have?

As Roland finally returns to the bridge he’d seen earlier, he lets out a groan of frustration when he finds the trail he’s been looking for. There is indeed a set of fresh footprints on a worn, muddy path—one that unfortunately leads uphill and into the woods. He’s going to have to tap into some nonexistent energy reserve, or he’s going to lose that trail in the darkness as the night creeps further in. ‘ _If this is some allegorical dying dream, this part must be the road to hell,_ ’ Roland thinks bitterly as he begrudgingly begins the ascent. ‘ _Or, at the very least, some form of purgatory._ ’

With each step, every muscle in his body hurts, especially those in his left leg and right side. The path only ever seems to slope steeper and steeper upwards. This Sisyphean situation isn’t helping Roland’s suspicions that this is all part of some guilt trip dying dream. Being forced to carry a young man who might be the personified representation of his regret towards being an absentee parent to his own son uphill through a dark forest in the cold and the pouring rain with no end in sight seems like an acceptably metaphorical personal hell… Or perhaps he is merely overthinking things in order to distract himself from the very real pain, cold, and exhaustion he feels.

The foliage along the path shakes occasionally, and more than once, Roland catches a glimpse of creatures who look like oversized bipedal hamsters or wolves with spines mixed into their fur, watching him intently before disappearing into the undergrowth. The appearance of these monsters presents a new problem for him: with Evan on his back, there’s no way that Roland can swing a sword with his full strength or aim his gun accurately. And if he were to put Evan down in order to fight, he was much too exhausted to guarantee that he could drive all these creatures away before they had a chance to swarm Evan anyway. Plus, he doesn’t even know if he would then have the strength left over to pick Evan back up afterward.

Roland already has the sword drawn from his arms band, but he’s been using it as more of an improvised walking stick and machete so far. Despite the numbness in his fingers, he tightens his grip on the weapon as the snarling of the lupine monsters behind him grows louder… but then the snarls turn to whimpers as the familiar sounds of plate metal creaking and soldiers yelling fills the air. Roland just barely makes it behind a tree with Evan before a trio of Ding Dong Dell soldiers marches past, weapons still stained in wolf-creature blood.

“—off on a wild chase in the middle of nowhere in the middle of a bloody storm in the dead of night!” One of the soldiers is in the middle of griping. “When we ought to be back at the castle, at the celebratory feast like everyone else! What a joke!”

“D’you want to go an’ explain all that to the Black Knight then?” Another retorts. “‘Cuz I doubt he’s gonna let you shove off early… He’d sooner cut you down where you stood like that handmaiden! Better to just play along for now, and let ‘im figure out that the prince and the spy probably already drowned on his own time. I certainly don’t want to get carved into pieces like a roast by that mindless brute…”

So Ratja was gone for good; Roland expected as much when he realized what her plan was on the bridge, but even so... Just knowing that the Black Knight is skulking around and searching for the two of them is enough to give Roland a boost of renewed fight-or-flight energy once the soldiers’ voices fade away into the woods. Unfortunately, it doesn’t last him very long. Roland only makes it to the edge of the small forest before his injured leg and a surge of lightheadedness forces him to stop in his tracks. Luckily, he manages to grab onto a nearby tree before he faceplants into the ground and takes Evan along with him.

Roland feels a trickle of liquid running down his brow, thoughtlessly wiping what he assumes to be rain or sweat away… only to notice blood staining the cuff of his sleeve when he looks down. On his other hand, the soaked makeshift bandage is also starting to leak blood.

Oh. Well then. As if things couldn’t get any worse—

“I have you now.”

Roland turns around, and the Black Knight himself has seemingly materialized out of nowhere in the open field before him. For the briefest of moments, Roland considers abandoning Evan for the minuscule chance of saving his own skin… before raising his sword and staring down the Black Knight defiantly. He owes it to both Evan and Ratja to at least attempt a last stand…

Valiant as his intentions may be, this last courageous gesture has the opposite effect as Roland completely loses his balance while attempting to raise his blade and crashes to the ground. The sword slips out of his numb fingers and dematerializes back into his arms band in a shower of sparks, just in time for him to miss it as he hits the ground with a painful thud. Thankfully, Evan lands beside him on a slightly softer patch of grass. At least he’s still unconscious, and won’t feel any pain... 

“Evan… I’m sorry…”

With the Black Knight advancing upon them, surrounded by a strange purple aura that someone with only the tiniest awareness of magic can barely perceive, Roland lacks the energy to even summon the gun from his arms band in a last-ditch defense. The whole world seems to be fading into darkness around him. His eyelids are so heavy he can barely keep them open. The last thing Roland remembers is a figure—one not clad in armor—approaching him as the Black Knight is surrounded by a circle of spinning colored lights...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Constructive criticism is appreciated!
> 
> Triggers/Warnings: Blood, Injuries


	4. The Unexpected Houseguests

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompts: No. 10 - “Blood Loss” “Internal Bleeding”  
> No. 21 - “Hypothermia”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to MemoriesoftheAlhambra ([Tumblr](https://memoriesofthealhambra.tumblr.com/)/[Ao3](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MemoriesoftheAlhambra/pseuds/MemoriesoftheAlhambra)) for beta reading!

“Gently now, my dears… gently… easy does it now…”

“Hig!”

“Yes dearie, I know they must be heavy, but we can’t jus’ leave the poor things out in the wet an’ the cold all roughed up like this, can we now?”

“Piggle!”

Ever since her “retirement”, Martha (Auntie Martha to a select few) has lived in her isolated corner of the world with only her higgledies (and the occasional visiting relative) for company without any issue. The land her cottage has been built on is technically Ding Dong Dellian soil, but she was never big on asking for permission and the kingdom would have to be in financially dire straits to send a tax collector way out here. Indeed, she has never seen so much as a flag from the kingdom in her neck of the woods until tonight.

Martha was heading home from an afternoon of picking wild herbs (it took more than a bit of a storm like this to scare her) when some of her little lovelies came back from their wanderings reporting mousefolk soldiers traipsing up and down the riverbanks loudly, as if searching for something or someone in particular. Martha may prefer her isolation, but she could never resist a bit of mystery or gossip, so she decided that a bit of investigating was in order. She’s never been one to pay attention to politics and such, but there was something fishy about how all of the soldiers her higgldies spotted were mousefolk—had all the grimalkin and humans in Ding Dong Dell suddenly abandoned the kingdom?

Her little lovelies also reported a mouse in imposing, dark armor with a dark aura about him skulking about as well. This was slightly more of a direct cause for concern to Martha; it had been some time, but she still remembered how badly negative energies like that could affect her higgledies…

Martha didn’t have to look very hard to find this dark knight—she could hear him clanking across the plains before she spotted him scurrying towards the treeline by the riverbank. Some of her higgledies shook uneasily as dark energy solidified around him, strengthening as he drew his sword and advanced on two figures, already lying prone on the ground. Memories of an adolescence spent fighting back injustice and tyranny came flooding back to her. For old time’s sake, Martha decided that this particular knight needed to be taught that bringing darkness to a peaceful land and preying upon the helpless wouldn’t be tolerated while she was still around!

(The Black Knight, so focused on his prey, did not even notice that he had been surrounded until it was too late for him. The higgledies, glowing with magical power, spun around him in a rainbow blur until the teleportation spell plopped him right into the middle of the lake at the center of the town hundreds of miles back in Ding Dong Dell. When later questioned by Mausinger and Vermine, he could not produce a satisfactory answer for how he got there.)

As her higgledies worked their magic on that mean old knight, Martha decided to have a gander at whoever the Black Knight had been advancing upon with such evil intent. She didn’t know what exactly it is she expected to find, but it certainly wasn’t two young men who looked like they’ve gone through the wringer. One was still just a boy with some grimalkin blood in him, judging by the ears. The other was clad in strange garb from parts unknown to her.

To Martha’s surprise, both were still alive somehow—although that could easily change for them without her help, especially for the older one. The color was already draining from his face, and trails of blood were already visibly leaking into the puddle of rainwater he was lying in from a sizable gash in his head and a badly wrapped wound on his right palm. Judging by the state of their drenched clothes and the tinge of blue in their lips, the two of them had either been out in the storm all day or gone for an ill-advised swim in the Resonant River.

Martha’s first priority was to get the injured young men out of the storm. She wouldn’t be able to do much for them if she couldn’t properly identify their injuries, and she couldn’t do that without the bright lights of her cozy cottage.

The banishment spell that the higgledies just performed took a lot of their energy to cast, but luckily the walk back to her cottage wasn’t too far. Martha’s little lovelies may look small, but she’s seen the little personifications of natural phenomena do impressive things for their size. Truth be told, she was more concerned about them accidentally exacerbating one of the boys’ injuries on the trip over. The silly little things didn’t know their own strength sometimes.

As some of her higgledies carried the bodies towards the cottage (with minimal complaining thankfully), Martha sent the others on ahead. Once she arrives back home with her unexpected houseguests, she finds the fire in the kitchen blazing brightly and every other source of light in the cottage concentrated around two massive piles of blankets. Her little lovelies have also managed to scrounge up a separate pile of linens, some dried soreaway leaves to supplement the fresh ones she’d just picked, and buckets for the hot water that was currently bubbling in the cauldron on the fire.

In the proper light, both young men look far worse for wear than Martha’s initial impressions of them had led her to believe. The Resonant River is fed by meltwater from the mountains to the north of the kingdom, and therefore freezing cold the whole year round. If both of them had spent significant time in the river before wandering around in that nasty storm, the next step for her should be to get them out of their wet clothing as soon as possible and warmed up before the hypothermia can set in properly. This would also give her time to assess the rest of their injuries. The older one especially looks as if he’s lost a lot of blood.

“Right then,” Martha says, rolling up her sleeves as the higgledies deposit the young men into the blanket-nests and the fighters among them step to the side to let the healers take over. “No more time to waste. You know what to do.”

“Hig-pig!” Her little lovelies are well trained at giving first aid by now; they needed something constructive to do after retirement from wyvern-slaying had left them sedentary and crabby. (Martha had been afraid they would lose their adorable forms and return to being phenomena without enough external stimulation.) The fire and light elemental higgledies gather around the two young men, trying to raise their body temperatures through their natural thermal output, since too much warmth all at once was bad in a different way. It seems to be working, as both of them are starting to shiver—a good sign at this stage of hypothermia.

Martha starts with the oldest, but before she can remove his jacket a cold hand weakly clasps around her wrist. “Evan… first…” he demands weakly, lacking the strength to even open his eyes.

Despite his current state, Martha’s highly independent personality won’t just let her take orders from a stranger without a fight. “I think not,” she states firmly, indignantly, but gently, removing his hand. “Your young friend can wait his turn, you are in far worse condition with—”

“Please.” The dark-haired man manages to open his fever-bright eyes and stare right at her. “... w-won’t wake… up… p-please…”

“Oh… very well then,” Martha relents reluctantly. She’ll just have to be quick about treating the youngest if his friend is just going to work himself into a state otherwise. She waves a couple of her healers over to keep an eye on the older man’s condition, then instructs the others to see if they can’t figure out why the fair-haired one hasn’t regained consciousness yet as she removes his torn and sopping wet clothing to see how bad the damage is.

The boy is quite lucky indeed; most of the cuts and bruises he’s received are superficial, and everything else will heal up with a few day’s rest. Martha deals with wrapping up the deeper wounds and applying soreaway to the nastier bruises as her higgledies work their magic. She didn’t quite understand the finer mechanics of how higgledy healing magic worked (every wizard she had ever tried to ask immediately overloaded her with technical terminology, or dismissively insisted that sorcery was superior in every conceivable way—at which point she took that as an insult to her little lovelies and had to slap them), but a halo of runes appears around Evan’s head for the briefest of moments. Afterward, one higgledy reports that there’s only a bruise from when the boy was knocked unconscious by a large rock in the river. There should be no lasting damage done. They’ve never been wrong before, so Martha doesn’t question their methods.

The fair-haired boy starts to twitch and his breathing evens out as the warmth begins to spread through his body. So Martha finishes up her ministrations by wrapping Evan up in blankets and instructing the idle higgledies to curl up around him so he doesn’t move around too much. She’s just in time to hear anxious chirps from the higgledies stationed by his older friend, as his pulse and breathing have both slowed down significantly. He doesn’t respond this time as she tears open his shirt to discover that her initial diagnosis had been correct: his injuries are far, far worse.

The man’s pallid skin from heavy blood loss makes the patchwork of bruising around his chest and abdomen (especially on the right side—probably a sign of damage to the internal organs and internal bleeding) look far worse than it already is. Blood is still pooling out of the deep gashes in his head and right palm, even though the wounds should have begun clotting by now. Both are also showing clear signs of infection—hence the fever. The deep bruises on his left leg tell Martha that there are most likely multiple tiny fractures there as well, probably made worse by his attempt to walk and/or carry Evan to safety. He’s stopped shivering completely.

Martha calls out for more soreaway and clean linens before washing her hands in the nearest clean bucket. As her little lovelies oblige, she lets out an exasperated sigh before getting to work. “This is all your fault, you know,” she admonishes the unconscious man as she and her higgledies attempt to mop up the worst of the bleeding. “I told you that you were in the worse state, but you ‘ad to insist that I take care of your friend first, despite—”

“R-roland!” This, of course, is the exact moment that Evan regains consciousness—when all of his friend’s wounds and bruises are prominently visible, surrounded by strange creatures in a strange place. The higgledies around him struggle to pin him down as he panics and writhes about trying to escape the carefully constructed cocoon of blankets. “G-get away from him! Let me go!”

When a flailing kick sends one of the higgledies flying across the room, Martha decides to step in. The healer higgledies take over with Roland as she goes to deal with her other patient.

“That’s quite enough of that now, young man!” she tuts in what her granddaughter Alice likes to call ‘the bossy voice’. “Your friend’s in a bad way right now, but he’ll pull through, don’t you worry. But you screamin’ an’ moving about ain’t gonna make that go any faster now, If anythin’, it’s going to me slow down if you keep squirmin’ and undo all my careful handiwork! Now, be a good lad and sit tight for me, alright?”

Evan makes a noise of automatic protest before he realizes that she’s right. Martha immediately regrets her stern tone as his ears droop and he lets out a soft sniff as he curls up. The higgledies around her give her puzzled looks, but she just shushes them and waves them over to Roland for the moment. She knows how to deal with this too.

“There, there,” she murmurs as she pulls him close, tightly but gently as all of the waterworks that have been held back for the past day or so start. As he sobs into her dress, the higgledies look at him quizzically, then up to her for an explanation. Martha herself has questions as to how these boys got into whatever trouble they’ve clearly been through, but there will be time for that later.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Constructive criticism is appreciated!
> 
> Triggers/Warnings: Injuries, Blood, Panic Attack


	5. While You Were Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompts: No. 11 - “Defiance” “Struggling” “Crying”  
> No. 12 - “I Think I’ve Broken Something” “Broken Down” “Broken Bones”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to MemoriesoftheAlhambra ([Tumblr](https://memoriesofthealhambra.tumblr.com/)/[Ao3](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MemoriesoftheAlhambra/pseuds/MemoriesoftheAlhambra)) for beta reading!

Time is meaningless to Aranella. She could have been trapped in this tiny room for anywhere between hours to days by now. The only reason she knows that the cell she’s in is completely empty is due to the weak light that emanates from a small hatch located at the bottom of the heavy door. It only stays open long enough for someone to toss a crust of bread through the gap before thunderously slamming shut again, but it’s enough to briefly illuminate the small room.

Three times had been enough for Nella to see all there was to see of this barren, pitch black, and cold prison cell. Her captors hadn’t even thrown a ratty old blanket in with her, and the official uniforms of the castle handmaidens were not made with the intent of laying on a frigid floor. The stone walls are so thick that she can’t even hear the guards march over to her cell door until they lift the heavy latch. Going by her assumptions about who has taken her prisoner, Nella wouldn’t be surprised to learn that she’s currently being held underground somewhere due to the sheer lack of ambient noise.

Vermine hadn’t seemed particularly suspicious of her when he’d dropped yet another litany of strange errands on Nella, this time ordering her to have them all finished by the coronation. (Even though she ought to have been helping Prince Evan get ready for his big day—that was her job after all.) But word of her asking questions about the recent strange behavior of him and some of the other folks at the castle must have gotten to Mausinger’s advisor, because a band of armed mousefolk soldiers had been waiting for Nella just outside the borders of the kingdom.

All of her bodyguard combat training wasn’t enough to avoid being overwhelmed by their sheer numbers, but Nella had gotten some pretty good hits in before they’d taken her down. (She almost felt sorry for the one mouse who no doubt would be wearing an eyepatch for the rest of his days after a well-aimed strike of her knife.)

Not that she’d gotten out of the fight unscathed. The cold floors had brought some relief to the throbbing black eye and sprained (or possibly broken?) right ankle she’d woken up with, at least. It had been a constant struggle to find a position in which she could take advantage of that without exposing any bare skin to the cold or aggravating any of her other bruises, one in which she’d had very little success. The ankle might be the worst of her injuries. She hasn’t even tried to stand up yet because every attempt at putting weight on it had resulted in unbearable pain.

After what seems like an eternity in the dark, the cell door begins to open and torchlight spills into the room. Despite her pain and near-starvation, Nella still tries to leap up and rush the four figures that enter out of sheer reflex. In her current state, this merely results in her awkwardly throwing herself at the feet of an elite mousefolk guard and receiving a reflexive kick in the ribs from an iron boot in response.

When the wave of fresh pain has subsided, Nella finds herself upright and pinned against the wall by two of the elite guards. She tries to shift her weight so that she’s not putting as much pressure on her injured ankle while trying to stare down the other two figures in the room. Surprisingly, Vermine isn’t one of them. The Black Knight—or Matthias, as Ratja had informed her earlier—stands silently behind his master like an intimidating statue. Mausinger himself looks like the cat who got the cream…

… or rather, the rat who got the crown. Holding aloft an ornate sword that hums with magical power, Mausinger smugly explains that he’s just finished his coronation ceremony and made his pact with Oakenheart, and therefore is officially king of Ding Dong Dell. Nella’s heart skips a beat as she watches the green and gold ribbon-like energy of a Kingsbond swirl around the blade. In her shock and disbelief, she can’t even summon the energy to call Mausinger a liar out loud, despite the glowing sword in his hand that proves otherwise. If Mausinger is now king, then that means that Evan—

“Now, you may be thinking: ‘Where does this leave me in the inevitable reshuffling of the castle staff?’,” Mausinger begins with an insufferably snide expression. Nella glares back at him, a spark of renewed fury in her heart flickering into existence. “Worry not; even though your charge may be gone, your own experience and skills are far too valuable to Ding Dong Dell to just dismiss you. I can still find some use for you in—”

“What have you done to Evan!?” Nella demands hoarsely once she’s finally found her voice. She’s quaking with so much rage that the faintest sound of shaking metal fills the room as the guards tighten their grip on her. Even as their armored paws dig into her bruised skin, Nella is momentarily unaware of her physical pain as she waits for an explanation from Mausinger, murder in her eyes.

“Very little, I’m afraid,” Mausinger replies with a frustrated scoff. He then explains that an agent from Broadleaf had attempted to extract Evan from the castle during the coup, to Nella’s confusion. What did Broadleaf have to do with any of this? From what she knew of the newest great kingdom across the sea, they were more concerned with economic growth and soft power through technological dominance than overt political intervention. This was certainly an odd time for them to start making power plays like this.

Mausinger then reveals that this foreign agent had gotten some assistance from someone unexpected within the castle: Nella’s fellow handmaiden, Ratja. This news fills Nella with dismay. She had been trying so hard to keep Ratja and the other handmaidens from getting involved in this whole mess; none of them were trained warriors in the slightest. If any of them had been dismissed from the castle or hurt due to Mausinger—

“...but their ill-fated escape ended when my soldiers cornered them on a bridge over the Resonant River. Rather than surrender and die honorably, your precious princeling and his compatriot from abroad decided to leap over the edge and take their own lives instead.” Mausinger’s bitterness that his dreams of personal revenge against House Tildrum had been denied to him is palpable in his tone of voice. “My soldiers recovered what remains had survived further downstream, and then fed them to the hedgehounds. And thus, I may begin my glorious reign with my claim to the throne uncontested. Just as well, we have a war to prepare for after all—”

“LIAR!” Nella screams, struggling against the guards pinning her to the wall with renewed energy. She puts all of her strength into breaking free so that she can grab the mouse a few feet away by his neck and throttle him to death with her bare hands. Her efforts go unrewarded, however, especially once the guard on her right has finally had enough. His heavy armored boot stomps down on her injured foot with a sickening crunch. If her ankle wasn’t broken already, it most certainly is now. Through a fresh howl of pain, Nella doesn’t notice that Mausinger fails to meet her eyes as he insists that Evan is absolutely, most definitely dead with evident glee.

Tears welling in her eyes, Nella hesitantly asks about Ratja. Here, Mausinger’s celebratory mood finally falters. There is a subtle air of reluctance as he declares that due to her attempt to aid the ancestral enemy of mousekind, Ratja was branded a traitor to her race and executed for her crime by the Black Knight. Said executioner behind him shows no outward reaction to this statement.

Nella can no longer hold back her tears. “How dare you!” She shrieks at Mausinger through heavy sobs. “Ratja was one of the most caring and kind-hearted people I’ve ever known! She always assumed the best of everyone—even you! How dare you _vilify_ her for her charity and compassion, you… _you **MONSTER**_!”

(Through her tears, Nella misses Mausinger taking a step back in shock at her words as if he’d been slapped in the face. A long-forgotten memory bubbles to the surface of his mind: the only other mousefolk working in the castle at the time, a young handmaiden of the queen, comforting him during a moment of weakness when it seemed like even King Leonhard had joined his other advisors in turning against Mausinger…)

“And _you_!” Nella now turns her anger towards the Black Knight, who remains as impassive and emotionless as ever. “Ratja told me that you and her used to be old friends. How could you so callously _murder_ someone you used to be so close to just like that?” The Black Knight is silent. “Well, _Matthias!?_ ” Nella screams. “Do you have _anything_ to say for yourself, you brute!?”

A moment of silence passes. At last, the Black Knight speaks. “All who disobey King Mausinger are traitors to mousekind,” he monotones in a deep voice that sends a shiver up Nella’s spine. “And all traitors must die, for the sake of Ding Dong Dell.”

In the back of her mind, Nella suspects that there’s nothing left of “Matthias” in that suit of armor anymore…

This declaration seems to snap Mausinger out of his stunned state. Quickly recomposing himself, he curtly informs Nella that Vermine will be in shortly with the finer details on her new “posting” with only a facsimile of the threatening tone he had earlier. Afterward, he abruptly leaves without another word, along with the two elite guards.

(The Black Knight does not follow him. He doesn’t even seem to acknowledge his supposed master’s departure as he continues to simply watch Nella, motionless as an armor-clad scarecrow. With Mausinger gone, the oppressive dark aura that surrounds him hangs heavily in the air.)

With the guards holding her upright gone, Nella sinks back down to the floor as her leg gives out from underneath her. The tears won’t stop coming; it’s hard to tell how much of the pain that courses through her whole body is due to her physical injuries and how much is the wave of overwhelming grief that has just come crashing down upon her, dragging her further down into despair.

She couldn’t save anyone. King Leonhard had trusted her to protect his only son, and she had failed him. Evan had trusted her with his life, and she had failed him too. Ratja had died trying to make up for Nella’s absence when Evan had needed her the most, only for her sacrifice to have been made in vain. Ding Dong Dell had fallen to the enemy, and Nella hadn’t been there to stop it.

* * *

After a while, the tears dry out and a numbness sets in deep within her bones. That’s when Nella becomes aware of another overwhelming presence in this tiny room—one the dwarfs even the formidable dark aura the Black Knight emits. This stranger is dressed in white and purple robes from an ancient land, with an ornate gold mask in the shape of a cobra.

Out of the corner of her eye, Nella can spy Vermine cowering at the threshold of the door, watching the stranger warily. Yet he doesn’t call the guards to come and remove this person...

Despite the dark energy swirling around his form, the stranger’s expression as he looks down upon Nella’s broken body lacks any malice whatsoever. Nella can only stare back blankly, too worn down and exhausted for anything else.

“I have known your despair,” he begins without warning, in a voice deeper than the oceanic rifts that divide the seas. “I too know what it feels to lose everything you hold dear in one fell swoop, with no forewarning. To feel overwhelmed in the regret of a thousand things unsaid, a thousand choices unmade. This is why I shall grant you this kindness.”

The mysterious stranger holds out his hand towards her and a circle of runes begins to form from the tips of his fingers. The last functioning synapse in her brain recognizes the symbols and is screaming at her to look away from the light before it’s too late, but Nella can’t pull her eyes away from the magic circle that has slowly begun to spin in the palm of the stranger’s hand. His voice suddenly seems to come from miles away and yet right next to her ear at the same time as everything else in the world aside from the stranger’s voice and the spell fades away slowly.

“You will feel no more pain, no more despair. **_You will feel nothing_**.”

The darkness rises up to meet her and Nella lets it carry her away, leaving behind nothing but emptiness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Constructive criticism is appreciated!
> 
> Triggers/Warnings: Injuries, Torture, Implied Brainwashing, Emotional Whump


	6. Devils and Blackhearts (and Really Bad Eggs)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Taking a break from Whumptober in this chapter for some much-needed levity!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is currently unbetaed, constructive feedback would be greatly appreciated!

“Well, shiver me timbers an’ blow me away, is that who I thinks it ‘tis, or has an angel finally arrive to collect me thrice-damned soul?” Captain Roger exclaims as he catches sight of a familiar face heading down the Orchard Port docks towards him and his pride and joy, the _Wavetracer_. Nowadays, he’s strictly a cargo merchant (although he can be flexible with the definition of “cargo” for the right amount of guilders…). But once upon a time, he and his crew were some of the most feared buccaneers to sail both of this world’s major seas.

They usually kept their pirating to the open ocean, but every once in a while during the leaner seasons, dwindling provisions forced them to raid some of the coastal towns for supplies. And that’s how he’d met her: Captain Roger had scoffed at the reports of his battered lackeys as they came back to the ship with reports of a single young woman with the magical capabilities to take out scores of fully grown men without lifting a finger. Grumbling at their incompetence, he set off to find her with cutlass and flintlock in hand to take her down himself—at which point the fiery bespeckled red-haired young lass summarily kicked his ass… and stole his heart.

After that, Captain Jolly Roger and Little Miss Martha (as she was called back in those days) kept running into each other every time the _Wavetracer_ made port in the northern half of the Summerlands. (He’d called it fate, and his first mate at the time just rolled her eyes.) He’d stop in the middle of looting and pillaging to pull out a stolen jewel and profess his love, she’d wipe the floor with him before he could finish his speech… Ah, young love! It was truly a simpler time back then.

The young lovebirds chased each other up and down the continent for years until that fateful day when Martha decided to retire from adventuring and settle down in a cottage somewhere with her “little ones”. (He hadn’t even known that she was seeing someone else this whole time!) It damn near broke his heart, doubly so once he realized that he too was getting on in years and the thrill of pirating had slowly slipped away from him without him even noticing.

Every once in a while, she would come and visit when the _Wavetracer_ would dock in the southernmost port of Ding Dong Dell, usually accompanied by one of her grandchildren. This time was no exception, as Captain Roger catches sight of a small, slight figure in a very frilly dress underneath a hooded traveling cloak clinging to Martha’s skirts as they pass by a group of rough-looking sailors. However, behind them is a young man wearing a blue mask and matching swordsman’s robe in the style of Goldpaw (but still unmistakably human) whom he’d never seen before. This man currently struggling with two overstuffed bags must be a son or a grandson he’s never seen before, or someone else entirely.

“Well now Roger, you ol’ scallywag!” Martha greets him cheerfully, with a Look. He knows this Look, and he’s come to dread it by now: this is the Look of a woman who wants something from him and knows exactly how to get it. “Your just the man I was lookin’ for! How much longer will you be stayin’ in port?”

“Er, well I was hopin’ to pick up a charter or two before shippin’ out…” With the regime change up at Ding Dong Dell proper, there were suddenly a lot of wealthy grimalkin willing to part with a large sum of guilders to take a ship to literally anywhere else but here. The _Wavetracer_ had seen better days to be sure, but he’d been positive that there’d be someone desperate enough to hire out the services of him and his crew for a small fortune…

“Brilliant!” cries Martha, clasping her hands together. “Then I’ve got just the passengers for you right ‘ere! You remember my granddaughter Alice from the last time you were here, don’t ya?” She gently nudges the well-bundled up girl (Roger can barely see any of her face peeking out from underneath all that fabric) forward a little. Truth be told, Roger would not have recognized Martha’s granddaughter at all if she hadn’t told him; the Alice he vaguely remembered had been a standoffish, overly talkative little pest of a child. The girl in front of him seems more like a silent, shrinking violet type with the way she hasn’t said a word to anyone at all.

But then again, it’s not as if he’s got much experience with children or the fairer sex at all. Maybe this was just something that happened to little girls as they got older.

“Well,” Martha continues, “we—plus our hired bodyguard for the occasion, uh… Jay! Ay, that’s his name!—need to get to Capstan-upon-Hull on the double! And there’d be no finer vessel to sail there in than the ol’ _Wavetracer_!”

(“Jay”, just like “Alice”, keeps his mouth shut while Martha bats her eyelashes at the former pirate. He’s lucky no one can see him rolling his eyes underneath the mask.)

If it was anyone else making this request, Roger would tell them to take a hike—specifically one through Cloudcoil Canyon, and then south past the Heartlands and through the Calmlands past Goldpaw. (It would be a quicker journey on land most likely anyway.) But he and Martha both shared an intense mutual hatred of the Sky Pirates who inhabited those mountains: Martha for what they’d done to her in the past, and him for being aeronautical phonies who thought they could appropriate _real_ pirate culture just because they weren’t anywhere near a proper body of water.

“‘ave ye heard that the new king of Ding Dong Dell has been sendin’ legions of troops up t’ Cloudcoil Canyon?” Roger asks conversationally, hoping to steer her away from the topic that would involve him missing out on the chance to earn himself a fortune. “They say there’s rumors of war goin’ ‘round, because of the foreign agents from Broadleaf and the like who tried to attack right after the mouse king took the throne. More’s fool for them; it’ll take ages to flush those sky vermin out of their dens.”

(‘ _An’ if the castle’s only focused on that campaign in the mountains, then that jus’ leaves the rest of the kingdom mostly unguarded then…_ ’ he thinks.)

“But why would Ding Dong Dell be attackin’ the Sky Pirates then if Broadleaf was the one who sent spies to the castle?” Martha asks. She quickly adds, “Not that I mind that someone’s finally giving those nasty Sky Pirates the thrashin’ they deserve, mind you. That’s the _one_ good thing that this new king has done at all.” She puts a steady hand on her granddaughter’s shoulder, and Roger observes that the seemingly shy girl is leaning forwards as if trying to hear their conversation more clearly. He certainly hadn’t taken the child he met before as one for having an interest in _politics_ of all things…

“Well, Broadleaf’s got all them metal men and funny flyin’ contraptions and such, don’t it? And Ding Dong Dell doesn’t, so I reckon that the mice think they need the sky-skimmers of Cloudcoil Canyon before they can take on those technology-types on their own turf,” Roger suggests, and is inordinately pleased when Martha praises him for the sheer brilliance of his idea. (So much so that he misses the significant looks that pass between “Alice” and “Jay”.)

“All the more reason to leave the kingdom for a little while!” Martha chirps, bringing the conversation back to its original topic (to Roger’s lament). “Come on, now! You know how much room the old girl has in ‘er hull—you’ll never even know we’re there half the time, don’t you worry! As for the other half, we’ll all make ourselves useful now, won’t we?” Her two companions nod in tandem.

“Err… and jus’ what do ye even want in Capstan anyways?” Roger asks, a bead of sweat starting to form on his brow. “It’s not like ye’ve got space for a boat of yer own up in them hills—”

“Oh no, Capstan-upon-Hull is just a stopping point before our true destination,” Martha clarifies, lowering her voice to a conspiratory whisper. “We’d have to find a wizard or someone who could lift the _Wavetracer_ over the sandbanks, plus enough provisions for the long voyage to Hydropolis.”

“Hydrop—? An’ what the blazes are ye wantin’ to do in Hydropolis!?” Roger asks incredulously. “Them funny fish folk don’t exactly welcome visitors, you know…”

“I’m afraid that’s a matter between us girls,” Martha replies, squeezing her granddaughter’s shoulder again with a mischievous smirk. “An’ since when have you ever cared if people wanted you somewhere or not!? What ‘appened to your spirit of adventure, Roger? I know the two of us are getting on in years, but we ain’t dead! Come on… why not have one last big hurrah before we get too old, huh? What do you say?” Her lower lip trembles a little, and suddenly he’s like a teenager all over again.

“Grr… umm… blast it! Curse ye, woman, and your wicked, persuasive tongue!” he finally cries, and it’s Martha’s turn to look very pleased with herself. “Very well! Get yerselves on board, we hoist anchor in an hour.” Curses! He won’t even be able to look any of his crew in the eyes once they find out about this...

“And no lies and secrets from me this time, ye hear!?” Martha just shoots him an amused look as she quickly waves her traveling companions over the gangplank and aboard the vessel proper before Roger can change his mind.

* * *

“Archon.”

In an instant, Leander Aristides is at his monarch’s side. “Yes, my Queen?”

Today, as always, Queen Nerea looks austere but radiant. The blue light filtered through the glass ceiling above reflecting off the surfaces of the Throne Room throws her stern features and sharp red eyes into relief. “All is well in my kingdom, then?” She asks cooly, with the implicit threat of pain should the answer to that question be anything other than a ‘yes’.

“Well…”

“Speak up, worm!”

Leander does not blanch at her harsh words; he knows all too well the immense pressure she is under every moment of every day. “A ship flying no known flags associated with any kingdom has just landed in Ankura Harbor. Among the departing passengers is a young man of part-human, part-grimalkin ancestry, who matches the description of a young king who has just been overthrown from the kingdom of Ding Dong Dell in the Summerlands.”

It had been a while since Hydropolis received visitors at all, much less any diplomatic parties. Were it not for the Travel spell he’d been taught when he was younger and a tiny fishing village off the Autumnian coast whose inhabitants didn’t ask questions when an oddly-dressed man appeared once every year and asked about the current state of the world in exchange for a basketful of valuable shellfish before disappearing, the whole kingdom would have been cut off from news of the outside world entirely.

Queen Nerea merely looks bored. “And?”

“Since he has traveled such a great distance,” Leander continues, “this young king has probably come to beg you for assistance in reclaiming his kingdom. I would advise against such an alliance; our current… situation aside, the rest of the great nations seem to be gearing up for war again as rumor has it that Ding Dong Dell is days away from declaring war on Broadleaf, the newest nation to gain a Kingmaker.”

This cycle of war has been recurring among the nations for generations: the same play on the same stage, but with different names and actors. Hydropolis stands to gain nothing from participating.

“Shall I… get rid of him?” Without thinking, the spear materializes in his hand. Leander is not a violent man… but he knows what’s at stake and what threat these newcomers possess to the kingdom, even if they may believe that they mean no harm.

Her Majesty shows no hesitation or ounce of emotion in giving the order. “Do what you must, for the sake of the kingdom.”

“It shall be done, my Queen.”


	7. The Dreamless Depths

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompts: No. 23 - “Exhaustion” “Sleep Deprivation”  
> No. 25 - “I Think I’ll Just Collapse Right Here, Thanks” “Disorientation” “Blurred Vision” “Ringing Ears”  
> No. 27 - “Earthquake” “Extreme Weather”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is currently unbetaed, constructive feedback would be greatly appreciated!

Her all-consuming nightmare began on a warm, sunny day with calm seas and the faintest of breezes. Children played in the streets, housewives and old folks gossiped in the cool shade, and workers exchanged pleasantries as they took to the tavern for their lunch breaks. There was no indication of the calamity to come, not a single warning sign from the geomancers or the soothsayers whatsoever.

Then the ground started to shake violently, upending roads and toppling whole buildings into the suddenly turbulent sea. And that was only the beginning. The sky turned black as hot ash and pyroclastic debris fell upon Hydropolis like judgment from a cruel God above, setting ablaze anything that hadn’t already been swallowed up by the massive waves. Terrified screams echoed through the city above until they were replaced by wet, guttural choking noises as the tiny shards of volcanic glass made it into human lungs and merfolk gills.

The Hydropolitans who attempted to flee underwater to escape the fires and deadly ash were met with scalding seas and the sight of the city below torn asunder by the earthquake that had preceded the eruption of an underwater volcano, from which lava began spilling out of. Those who hadn’t drowned or been crushed by the detritus of the initial eruption were slowly being boiled alive as they tried in vain to make it up to the surface.

It was in the midst of this chaos that Queen Nerea scrambled over the rubble of the wrecked Palace walls and past jets of boiling water to reach the throne room, clothes torn and staff clutched tightly in her burnt hands. Eyes already burning from the smoke and steam, she tried to avert her gaze as much as possible as she passed by the bodies of her fallen guards amidst the wreckage. As long as the Eye of Hydropolis still stood, she would have a catalyst large enough to cast the enchantment upon almost the entire city. And once she cast her modified version of Rejuvenate, everything would go back to the way it was—to the way that it was supposed to be.

Every ruler of Hydropolis was taught about the underwater volcanic vents that ran deep beneath the city, which provided the nutrients to sustain the massive reefs of the Hydropelago and the bountiful way of life they afforded the kingdom. “But nothing lasts forever,” is what Nerea’s father had warned her on his deathbed. “All empires must one day fall, all kingdoms crumble into ash. All you can do, my daughter, is pray to the Gods that fate does not come for Hydropolis during your reign.”

But Hydropolis would not fall—as it’s queen, she would not allow it to. She had locked herself in the Palace library for a week before her coronation in order to research how such a nightmare might be overcome without interruption. Eventually, Leander had managed to break the enchantments on the library doors and convince her to get some rest for the ceremony, but not before Nerea had come across one way to deal with such an apocalyptic scenario.

Rejuvenate in its base form—as Leander would probably remind her if he were here right now—was a spell so simple that even a child could cast it. It was meant to revive withered plants and fix broken objects, not resurrect an entire city and all the people who inhabited it. There was no guarantee that the Eye would be powerful enough for the modified spell, or even that she would be powerful enough to cast it.

And if she were to succeed… the spell would have to be rigorously maintained in order for the enchantment to continue the perpetuation of Hydropolis. The number of living souls in the kingdom must remain the same for the magic to work, no more and no less. That meant that she would have to make new laws to ensure that the population number remained the same while keeping their true purpose hidden from everyone else—especially Leander.

But the laws on their own would not be enough to ensure Hydropolis’s continued existence. Some brave souls would question the laws outright, but most of the danger would come from humans and merfolk being… humans and merfolk. Fallible beings, perfectly ignorant of what was at stake if they were to make one innocent mistake. Nerea would have to use the Eye, day in and day out, to make sure that the conditions of the spell were still met. That meant constant vigilance on her part, watching and listening to every citizen at every hour of the day and night.

That meant no sleep for Nerea. Not one wink or the spell would unravel. But how could she possibly sleep anyway, when her alternative was this nightmare she found herself in? Besides, there was no one who could possibly tell her no anymore. She had just watched the human that she loved more than life itself drown in boiling seawater after being crushed by a falling wall, with her trapped on the other side, completely powerless to stop it.

Giving up on sleep forever was no sacrifice when the alternative was living in a nightmare where her beloved Leander was gone.

Through her tears and sweat, Nerea made her way through the wreckage of the Throne Room, across shards of razor-sharp glass and stone that sliced her feet to pieces. (Her shoes had been ruined and discarded some time ago.) But she didn’t feel an ounce of pain as she reached her throne, somehow miraculously still intact despite the earthquake and the volcanic eruption. As she sat down and the panels that framed the throne slid shut around her, a quick scan of the Eye itself revealed that it was also undamaged.

But this could all change in an instant; there was no time to waste. The magic swirled around her in the form of luminescent seafoam as she cast the spell, oddly light and fragile considering the intentions of the enchantment and the power that it took to cast. Nerea dared not look through the eye to see the effects of time reversing in the kingdom outside, but she could feel the injuries on her hands and feet healing themselves (the burns fading, the blood pooling at her feet disappearing entirely) as the wheel turned backward for Hydropolis. The sun and the moon danced in their inverse orbits across the horizon as the clock reversed…

Until…

“Your Majesty?” asked Leander’s hesitant voice outside with the politest tap upon the panels of the mechanism enveloping the throne. Nerea’s eyes welled up with tears of relief at the sound, but she quickly dabbed them away with her sleeve. Leander could not ever know. No, Leander _must_ not ever know about what she had done, for him and for her kingdom.

After quickly composing herself, Queen Nerea slid the panels of the Eye open to reveal an intact Throne Room and a confused Archon, some time before the volcanic eruption. Through the doorway, she could see the living, breathing guards marching through the hallways and hear snippets of conversation from the palace sorceresses, no doubt gossiping. Everything was as it should be. But one false step, one tiny accident, and it all would come crashing down in an instant. The nightmare would return, and Hydropolis would fall once again to quake, fire, and flood.

“Assemble my ministers, the naval leaders, and the representatives of the major trading guilds,” Queen Nerea commanded her Archon as she stood up, mentally steeling herself for the task at hand. She could already guess that the laws she was about to propose to uphold the spell would not be well-received at first. But her people would come to accept them in time; after all, everything she had ever done as queen was for the benefit of Hydropolis as a whole.

Besides, it was only a temporary solution. The spell couldn’t hold forever. Queen Nerea would find a way to save Hydropolis from its predestined fate—she had to, she refused to accept a future in which her kingdom would not last for generations and generations more! She just needed more time...

Leander seemed puzzled but complied without question. “And…” Here Nerea hesitated.

_You were dead. You were dead, and I couldn’t live with myself if I had to live in a world without you by my side, my love._

“...fetch me another pair of shoes.”

Behind the silver glasses, there was a glint of amusement in Leander’s eyes. “It shall be done, my Queen.”

* * *

Three hundred years or so have passed since then, and it has felt like both an eternity and a blink of an eye all at once. Entire kingdoms and dynasties have risen and fallen on the continents while Hydropolis remains in temporal stasis, but not for very much longer. Despite her best efforts, the enchantment is beginning to fade as time in the outside world has gone on. And yet, she still has no solution for the calamity which is barely being held back by her diminishing power. The long-repressed nightmare is returning, and Nerea is at the end of her rope dealing with her current nightmare.

Reliving the same year over and over again has gotten monotonous to the point of absolute tedium. Her biggest fear was the sheer unpredictability of the citizens of Hydropolis, especially when faced with the new restrictive laws. But Nerea quickly discovered that while both humans and merfolk were creatures of habit, most of Hydropolis’s citizens adapted—some more easily than others—to the changes over the course of a year. Any dissenters are quickly identified and spirited away to the dungeons for the rest of the cycle, every cycle.

Worse than their compliance is their predictability. As it turns out, most people follow a set schedule day in and day out, with little variation in their daily routines. After enough cycles, she knows the names of every single citizen in her kingdom and can surmise with frightening accuracy what they are doing at any given moment. From the drunks at the bar who are ready to start a brawl at the drop of a hat, to the reckless children trying to climb up onto a high roof, to the lovers attempting to steal a secret kiss in their clandestine meeting place—she sends the guards after them with no remorse, if Leander has not already done so.

With the ludicrously high import taxes and other laws meant to discourage visitors from Hydropolis, there are rarely any random variables to keep her and her enforcers on their toes. Childish as she knew it was, there were a few earlier cycles in which she threw in a frivolous law—such as “all male citizens must wear a hat of the same color as the Archon’s hair when outside on a rainy day between sunrise to sunset”—for her own amusement, just to see what her people would do. But the people ultimately accepted every since one of them, even if they still tried to gossip behind her back about what strange laws they were indeed.

The gossip is undoubtedly the worst part of her necessary constant vigilance. Before she needed to watch over her people every waking moment of her existence like a new mother worried about her infant (or so she assumes, she has no experience in the matter), Nerea was unaware of just how much the citizens of her kingdom talked about each other behind their backs. Now, she hears everything her people have to say—every dark secret, every petty grievance, _everything_.

They talk about her constantly as well. Even in her rare moments away from the Eye, Nerea hears their voices echoing through her mind, every moment of every day. They speak of how their Queen never seems to make public appearances anymore.

(She has not left the Palace since the time loops began; most days she doesn’t leave the Throne Room. Sometimes, she catches glimpses of fire or scalding steam out of the corner of her eye that disappear as she turns her head. Sometimes, the ground shakes violently for the briefest of moments even if the rest of the Palace does not seem to react.)

How she always sends Archon Leander to do all the work as the public face of their kingdom. How from the rare glimpses they have gotten of their Queen, she always seems tired and diminished, as if her power is ebbing like the tide.

(There are no more mirrors in the Palace anymore. Nerea did not find the reflections within—of a morose and exhausted woman with swollen eyes shadowed by dark circles not even the strongest of cosmetic potions could conceal, and deep wrinkles on such a young-looking face, far too young to belong to her—acceptable, so she had them all thrown away.)

_Perhaps the Queen has fallen ill, and it is the Archon who truly rules Hydropolis now…_

Is Leander plotting her downfall in order to take the throne for himself? No, he can’t be—her Eye watches every inch of Hydropolis every single second of every single day and night.

**_But Leander is a talented wizard in his own right, surely he could be concealing something from you?_ **

Yes, Leander is a talented wizard; the two of them were inseparable as children so he knows just as much about magic as Nerea herself does, and more besides. But why would he be concealing something from her? And what possible reason would he have to usurp the throne from her?

**_He doesn’t trust your judgment as a ruler—he believes that you have grown too complacent and reliant on him. He does not appreciate all that you have done for your kingdom, all your sacrifices._ **

How very dare he.

**_Indeed. He has played the role of the loyal subordinate well, but_ must _you know in your heart that he means to backstab you as soon as the tides turn in his favor..._**

“Archon.”

“Yes, my Queen?” This weak, insipid man—who appears instantly at her side when she calls, like a dog—is whom the people say is the true power behind the throne?

“All is well in my kingdom, then?”

“Well…” The Archon looks away for a split second as he hesitates. In an earlier loop, Nerea would have welcomed the implication of possible deviation from the long-established routine, but she has run out of patience a long time ago.

**_Look, he is trying to deceive you, even now._ **

“Speak up, worm!”

The Archon speaks of distant politics, none of which truly concern her or Hydropolis, and of a foreign monarch who has arrived to beg for her alliance— _a meager distraction from the coup her own Archon means to execute, surely?_

**_If he wants the throne so badly, why not give it to him then? See how long he can manage before buckling under the weight of the responsibilities that you’ve had to suffer in silence over for three centuries?_ **

Now, there was an idea…

“Shall I… get rid of him?” The spear appears in his hands, and for the briefest of moments Nerea believes that he means to raise it against her.

“Do what you must, for the sake of the kingdom.” She answers, stone-faced.

“It shall be done, my Queen.” Oh, it had better be done, or there _will_ be hell to pay.

* * *

“I surrender to none but Her Majesty!” Leander’s voice breaks through the haze that has engulfed Nerea for the briefest of moments, finally bringing her out of the dreamless state she’s been trapped in. It feels like a dream in the sense that she can only see it for what it was once it is close to an end but without the feeling of restfulness or other positive effects of true sleep. It takes so much effort not to give in to her fatigue and fall back into those dreamless depths...

A deep voice behind her—one she recognizes as the voice that has been inside her head for a long time, bringing with it all those strange thoughts of Leander trying to take the throne from her—lets out a dark chuckle. “This has gone on long enough. Very well then, if that is what you wish, Archon...”

The familiar crisp hum of someone casting Frostbite multiple times fills the air and Nerea feels the sharp drop in temperature—tinged with an aura of pure malice—as the icicles hurl through the air towards their target. “No!” Multiple people scream and there is a sickening crunch as at least one of the spells hits something (or someone) dead on...

As her consciousness returns to her body, Nerea is suddenly all too aware that she’s left Hydropolis for the first time in centuries, standing on the grassy floor at the bottom of the Abyss next to her kingdom’s King’s Cradle. When did she get here? _How_ did she get here?

A young man with grimalkin ears—Evan, the former king of Ding Dong Dell, if Nerea's memory does not deceive her—and a dark-haired man in swordsman’s robes (if they were introduced, she does not remember his name) rush past her, weapons drawn. As they do, Nerea becomes aware of the presence of a figure cloaked in an overwhelmingly dark and powerful aura standing just behind her. The two visitors place themselves between her and the dark wizard with a cobra headpiece, and Nerea wonders what in the world she’s done to deserve this kind of protection from two total strangers. And where is—

“No…” Nerea finally looks down and is met with the sight of Leander, lying prone on the ground in front of her with an icicle right through his chest. Her own heart feels as if it has been stabbed clean through as she runs to him and falls to her knees. This has to be a nightmare, this isn’t happening, this isn’t happening—

“Y-your Majesty,” Leander stutters out through blue lips, shivering as the ice magic spreads through his blood. “Y-you are—” He coughs weakly. “—not h-hurt in any w-way...?”

Nerea nearly starts crying at the sheer irony as she takes his hand. How impossibly like him to be worried about her wellbeing as _he_ is slowly dying like this! “I-I am fine, Leander. Cease your fussing,” she manages to sputter in her building hysteria as she watches the frost spread through his veins and tries to think of a solution. She doesn’t know a fire spell weak enough to not kill him instantly in this state, a water spell would not defrost him fast enough to save him from the ice, and she’s never learned a healing spell, thinking she’d never be put in a position in which she’d need it because of all the offensive magic she had learned! Damn her younger self’s arrogance!

“H-hydropolis… the s-spell…?”

The spell? Wait… “You knew… you knew all along?” Of course he did—Nerea could never keep a secret from him, no matter how hard she tried.

With his breath growing shallower and shallower, Leander can only nod in response. The Ocean’s Aether appears in his hands, and he hands it to her with a quizzical expression. The color drains from Nerea’s face. Oh no… did he think that she needed that ancestral gemstone for some plan that she concocted to save the kingdom? She just wanted to be with him, to claim him as her husband, before the enchantment finally wears off and Hydropolis finally fades into obscurity.

And now...

“No!” she wails, tears running down her ashen face. “The Aether won’t— You know what will happen to the kingdom if you perish! If the number of souls in the kingdom changes... You can’t die, Leander! I… I order you to stop dying! H-how you dare you disobey your Queen!”

“I-I’m s...s-sorry…” The spell has spread so rapidly that the tears falling from his eyes crystalize before they can run down his face. With one last burst of strength, Leander places the Ocean’s Aether into Nerea’s hands. “I-I l-lov—”

That is all Leander can stutter out before the spell freezes him solid. As his last breath dissolves into the air, Nerea can feel the rush of magic course through her body as her spell on every living soul in Hydropolis breaks, but cannot do anything about it other than to let out a wild howl of pure grief. The Ocean’s Aether falls into her lap as Leander’s body dissolves into particles of ice and ashes. All that remains of him are a pair of silver spectacles, the metal frames warped and twisted by the sheer cold.

“Your kingdom is doomed. But then beauty never lasts...” the deep-voiced dark wizard intones with a hint of sarcasm, and Nerea looks up at him, face twisted in fury. He holds her Kingsbond in her hands, wrapped around itself like an orb, like a trophy of war. Willing the Ocean’s Aether away and summoning her staff again, Nerea stands up and does not even bother to wipe the tears from her face as she charges up a spell. This vile wretch! How dare he just stand there and _gloat_ as if he has not just brought her whole world crashing down upon her!

But before Nerea can take a step towards him, a massive shadow crosses over the pocket of air overhead. Why has Brineskimmer—who did not come when she called centuries ago and thus failed to protect the people of Hydropolis from the volcano before—awoken now? She tries to mentally send him away, only to feel the emptiness in her heart where their Kingsbond ought to be as she momentarily forgets that it has been forcibly taken from her. As her Kingmaker swims through the shield around the King’s Cradle and lands in front of her in a deluge of seawater, the young king and the swordsman from a distant land rush over to her side. Are they strong enough to take on an unbound Kingmaker, or is she leading more people to their deaths today?

But before Nerea can send them away, Brineskimmer lets out a roar and a burst of dark energy that transports them to another dimension. Even in his altered state, it seems that some ingrained instinct within the Kingmaker is still trying to protect his kingdom. So be it then, she will fight to the last for Hydropolis as well, despite the odds stacked against her. Evan and the swordsman draw their blades as Nerea charges up a Storm spell, letting her unbridled rage fuel her for this fight.

* * *

After one last bolt of Storm magic, Brineskimmer hits the ground, unresponsive. Nerea knows she hasn’t killed him—there are very few forces in this world powerful enough to truly _kill_ a Kingmaker—but it does give her a twisted sense of satisfaction to see the entity that was supposed to protect her kingdom and failed to do so at least twice now receive some sort of comeuppance for his inaction. Despite their lack of experience, Evan and his friend have fought well against the Kingmaker; if it still mattered, she would not have any regrets about the alliance she brokered with him in exchange for the Ocean’s Aether.

But their alliance is meaningless now—with Brineskimmer defeated, the magic returns them to the bottom of the Abyss. Time resumes and Nerea’s Kingsbond _shatters_ in the dark wizard's hand. The staff in her hands, the conduit used to create the Kingsbond, dissolves into wisps of seafoam as well. “No!” cries the wizard, before summoning a dark portal and absconding before Nerea can get her chance to exact revenge on her beloved’s murderer.

If her Kingsbond is _broken_ , then that must mean—

The entire Abyss shakes violently, and Nerea and the swordsman are thrown off their feet. (Evan’s grimalkin blood affords him the balance to remain upright.) As the world steadies itself again, there are loud explosive bursts in the distance as the pockets of air keeping the Abyss dry implode and gallons of seawater start to pour in from the floors above them. Nerea hears the young king and swordsman cry out in pain as the sudden decompression of massive amounts of air hits their eardrums, the half-grimalkin's ears probably having the worst of it.

She herself hears a loud pop followed by an incessant ringing drowning out all noise—as the water now flooding into the Abyss threatens to do to the three living souls who remain here—but Nerea is already casting the Travel spell to take her back to her kingdom without thought, acting on instinct alone. She has to get back to Hydropolis. She has to find a way to save her people. She has to do _something_!

The two visitors yell at her to wait (she presumes anyway, she can’t hear anything over the ringing in her ears) but the spell is already complete. The last thing she sees of the place is the patch of grass by the King’s Cradle covered in ash where her beloved’s body should have been lying and a pair of broken silver glasses before the magic takes her away.

* * *

Nerea can’t breathe.

Ever since she was a child, no shortage of governesses and tutors had stressed upon her that as a princess of human and merfolk blood, it was her birthright to rule Hydropolis, land and sea. The blood that courses through her veins enabled her to walk both halves of her dominion with ease and grace, guarding her people with her life in exchange for their undying loyalty. She had sworn as much on the day of her coronation as Queen, holding the Ocean’s Aether aloft as she recited her vows and sneaking glances at Leander who was as close to her on the dais as he could get. (If not for the damned ancient laws, she’d have him right there by her side.)

But Hydropolis is sinking beneath the waves in a plume of fire and ash as the seas bubble and boil, Leander is dead, and Nerea can’t breathe. As she walks through the corpse-strewn streets in a daze, the Ocean’s Aether still held in her hands—as if the symbolic gemstone has any sort of magical power whatsoever—she witnesses the carnage on the surface for the first time.

The ruined buildings are covered in a thick layer of ash that coats the ground like snow—molten hot snow. Every step burns, yet she keeps walking the empty streets of her once magnificent kingdom, even as her lungs protest the intrusion of a million tiny shards of volcanic glass with every breath. Blood begins to run from her nose and the corners of her mouth. She can feel blood trickling down from her ears as well, the ringing within from her collapsed eardrums still drowning out all sound of the destruction around her. (If her eyes are bleeding as well, she’s already cried far too many tears to feel it.) All the bodies she passes have trails of blood running from every orifice. This must be how they died; it’s only fitting that as their queen that she do the same.

_‘This is all my fault. I failed you all.’_

This is her nightmare, her very worst nightmare, back with a vengeance. A nightmare she will never wake up from.

Distantly, she feels a hand grab onto her forearm before a sharp yanking sensation somewhere in her gut tells her that someone is casting Travel. A quick glance behind her reveals that it’s Evan—holding on to her with one hand and clutching a rather lacy handkerchief up against his nose and mouth with the other. Despite his best efforts, the cloth is already stained with spots of bright crimson. Blood is trickling from his eyes and ears too, but his face is scrunched in concentration as he powers through the pain to finish the spell and send them safely to their destination.

Why is he helping her at great risk to his own health, even when it does not benefit him at all with her kingdom now in ruins? And how does a child know such an ancient— ah, of course. Leander must have taught him that spell to make it back from Leucippes’ Labyrinth as quickly as they had…

The spell transports them just inside the entrance to the Abyss, where the sea has already reclaimed most of the chasm as the tide laps at the Waystone a few feet away. Nerea feels the Ocean’s Aether—that suddenly feels heavier than an entire mountain—slip out of her weak grasp. She doesn’t even hear it clatter against the coral floor—nor feel Evan’s grasp on her arm slip away as he collapses beside her—as her world blurs and tilts violently until she is caught by a pair of strong arms.

For the briefest of moments, she wonders if this is the robed swordsman. Then out of the corner of her eye, she sees him beside her carrying Evan. He is moving at an oddly slow pace, even with Evan in his arms—possibly vertigo from decompression sickness, some detached part of her brain helpfully supplies—as he makes his way towards a frumpy, middle-aged woman with a pack of concerned-looking higgledies clustered around her ankles.

Real higgledies? Here, of all places? Leander would have loved this…

The older woman takes one look at the swordsman, then starts frantically shouting at someone behind her. Several rough-looking sailors appear out of seemingly nowhere to help them, possibly comrades of whoever is carrying her. (Nerea tries to turn her head to check, but everything is a murky blur.) The woman then points exaggeratedly towards a ship (or at least it appears to be something resembling a ship through her murky eyesight) docked outside, the skies above tinted grey with distant clouds of ash.

But that’s the last thing that Nerea sees: her vision distorts further as three centuries of exhaustion and lack of sleep finally catch up to her. Someone is screaming at her not to shut her eyes, but why should she listen to them—she is a queen! A queen of ash and ruin and corpses…

Nerea can feel the soft, yet insistent touch of sleep coming to claim her. And she prays to the Gods that she does not wake up again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Constructive criticism is appreciated!
> 
> Information about Decompression Sickness is from the [Merck Manual](https://www.merckmanuals.com/home/injuries-and-poisoning/diving-and-compressed-air-injuries/decompression-sickness) (though obviously the real symptoms wouldn’t kick in as quickly, but then again this world has magic, so…).
> 
> Triggers/Warnings: Main Character Death, Mentioned Death by Natural Disasters (Fire, Drowning, Boiled Alive, Realistic Death by Volcanic Ash), Background Character Deaths, Implied Gaslighting, Mind Control, Impalement, Flashbacks, Brief Suicidal Thoughts


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